Muslim musicians enriched Sinhala music

By Amal HEWAVISSENTI

The major contributions made by Muslim musicians to Sri Lankan film music a few decades previously is ranked superbly excellent. The Muslim musicians' active involvement brought in a multicultural perspective to the Sinhala music arena and exploded the myths within Muslim communities towards music. The truly positive concern of Muslim musicians to Sinhala music directly appealed to a predominantly young, ethnically mixed audience in Sri Lanka who were limited in their chance to be exposed to multiple forms of music. The Islamic religious outlook has an approach to fine arts which is often misinterpreted to be rather sceptical.

M Ghouse

Some view Islam's approach to arts as condemnatory. In short, they give a Satanic quality to some forms of art specially music before the Muslim community and therefore professional Muslim musicians are a rare thing in Sri Lanka.

In this context, the emergence of Muslim musicians to contribute lavishly to Sinhala film music was and is very special thing because even the few musical masterpieces by them stand out with wider appeal for all times.

In whatever way the international role of Muslim musicians is admirably noted because they have gained influence over fine arts specially music.

A few decades back, Sri Lankan Muslim musicians were widely popularised by gramophone records and radio media. Several such musicians are distinguishable within the boundaries of Sri Lankan cinema music largely nourished by Indian music during '50s, '60s and '70s. They were Mohammed Ghouse, Nohammed Salee, T. N. Latheef, Harun Lantra, Mohideen Baig, J. M. M. Saadik, M. B. Hussain Aliyar and so forth.

Music classes

The first and most noticeable of these Muslim musicians was Mohommed Ghouse (Ghouse Master) who brought in a larger musical legacy from India in order to produce an upshot of Sri Lankan musicians with definite Sri Lankan identity.

His role in Sri Lankan music dealt a humiliating rebuff to the sceptical attitudes held by Muslim community towards music and its use. The gramophone and radio made this trend of music enterprise move in sharp acceleration when more musicians and singers shot to fame in Sinhala film music. The first half of 1960s saw a major breakthrough in reawakening of Sinhala music specially film music. It was the music classes primarily conducted by Sangeeth Visharad S. de S. Jayasekaraingha who was then the lecturer for music at the Government Institution of Fine Arts. The idea of classes for Muslim students of music was originally planned and sponsored by M. B. M. Ghouse (This is not Mohommed Ghouse the musician) who was a lecturer for painting at Government Institution of Fine Arts.

The class which comprised a batch of about 40 Muslim students of music was conducted in Government College of Music for three days per week. This really was for the first time in Sri Lanka.

Mohideen Baig, N. M. Maharoof, T. M. Tajudeen, M. M. Buhari, M. Subair Kareem, Mohommed Salee, O. Shariff, Harun Lantra, to quote a few who studied music under S. de S. Jayasekara. The class was held for three years and the management took care to test the students' academic and practical performance in music at the end of every year.

The musician with rare flair

Meanwhile, a prominent student of above said class, Mohammed Salee emerged as a major figure in the field of Sri Lankan music and his role professionally defined his career. In 1958 he was introduced to a cinema orchestra as a harmonium player under the guidance of veteran musician. R. M. Chandrasena. Prior to this, Salee (Master Salee) had sprung to be a popular key figure playing harmonium at parties (Peduru Sajjas) at houses of higher class families. His maiden performance in an orchestra was in the film "Wanaliya".

As Salee was professionally involved in direction of film music, some singers, film directors and producers highly exploited his skills to compose low-quality melodies which fell far short of musical standards.

Those melodies were chiefly suggestive of, or rather imitative of melodies of Hindi and Tamil songs, but this trend of imitation was an indelible blemish on otherwise promising aspects of music as a form of mass entertainment.

Salee's contribution

Harun Lantra

Yet these 'borrowed' melodies won him a rapturous applause from Sri Lankans at that time. Musicians like Salee could not employ most of his own creative music to glamorise the films for which he directed music. This happened because he had to give in to the 'authority of preference' to Hindi and Tamil music by most film directors and producers who were solely bent on popularizing their cinematic works.

His maiden music direction for the film "Mangalika" in 1963 struck the keynote of his musical supremacy which absolutely brought him a chance to work in partnership with good musicians and vocalists of the time.

Mohammed Salee directed music for about 18 films and while he was involved in music direction in some of them, he managed to get the combined support of veteran musicians and vocalists like Sarath Dasanayake, Premasiri Khemadasa, Shelton Premarathne, Mohideen Baig and Alfred Corea.

It appears fair to say that Mohommed Salee contributed several immortal tuneful melodies to the treasury of Sinhala music and they still remain with unabated fascinations for the Sri Lankan audience.

Among his own creations are the popular hits "Muladi Benda Aadarayaka", Ran eta pota ridi hawadi" (Sung by H. R. Jothipala). "Sandun gasaka ethi saman lathawaka", "Ruwan Medura", "Oba tharamata maa nelawu", "Esa rendunu rendunu thenwala" (vocalized by Milton Perera), "Oruwaka Paawena", Paaya a sanda", "Etha epita dura aakase" (vocalised by Milton Mallawarachchi) etc.

Passion to imitate Nayyar

Nothing more inspired and influenced Salee's musical lifestyle than the impressive image of O. P. Nayyar of India. It is popularly known that Salee openly imitated Nayyar and so successful was he in his imitation that he came to be lovably labelled as Sri Lankan Nayyar.

His undisguised admiration for Nayyar's music and style was so fervent that he even went to great expenses to go to India and meet Indian maestros. It is said that once he managed to discuss music with Indian Maestros such as Naushad, Madan Mohan and Shankar Jai Kishan but unfortunately he missed the chance to encounter his hero. O. P. Nayyar. Mohammed Salee died in 1988 at the age of 58.

Sajaad Hussain

Sajaad Hussain is yet another prominent Indian Muslim musician who tread on Sri Lankan shores to upraise the cinema music and who chanced to be impressed by the rhythm and sounds of 'Bera's (drums) in Sri Lanka.

Mohideen Baig, probably the most popular and influential Muslim vocalist was instrumental in bringing Sajaad to Sri Lanka on personal acquaintanceship, for direction of music in the film "Daiwayogaya" in 1958.

As Sajad expressed his deep desire to catch sight of panoramic Kandy Perahera, he was given the opportunity for watching it from the balcony of a top class hotel together with Mohideen Baig and some of the production team of the film.

Highly impressed, he was rhythmically following the beats and the 'exotic' sounds of Beras and Udekki being played in the perahera and said to Mohideen Baig.

"These rhythms are extremely attractive. I wish to combine these sounds and beats into a song for the film".

Accordingly, the levels of rhythms and sounds of local drums were attuned to the musical creation of "Jeewana gamane daiwayoge" (sung by Baig for Daiwayogaya) which earned him immense popularity with the audience.

The melodic properties and local colour latent in the musical compositions by this musician of alien culture reflected his superlative skill to adjust music to the social tone of any country.

Mohideen Baig

His most popular hits are "Hada gilei", "Aadariye ruchirananiye", "Jeewana gamane daiwayoge", "Mage puthata kokum pini", "Aadarayai karunawai", "Melawi yanna hada mage" and so on.

Music in obscurity

Galagedara M. M. A. Huck who lives in total obscurity was another leading Muslim musician to have enriched Sinhala cinema music with some of the most melodic songs of his own. His famous melody "Chandana ellen nala" composed for the film "Sujeewa"a brought a special award for H. R. Jothipala as the best screen voice in 1973.

The film was screened in popularity for 107 days continually. His encounter with director Joe Dev Anand in Jaffna had far reaching consequences on his music career because Huck's music became the driving force behind the huge success of Dev Anand's film directions.

Dev Anand's film directions marked a musical landmark for Huck as his melodies highly embellished the scenes in Anand's films such as "Sookiri kella", Obai Mamai", "Sujeewa", "Sunethra" and "Geetha". Huck's masterpieces as "Hitinna poddak hitinna", "Chandana ellen naala", "Hada santane", "Dakina dasune" "Etha wanapetha sarasala" etc later earned him "Kala Bhushana" award. Yet he despondently states that no satisfactory appraisal of his musical mission has not yet been made. He retired as a teacher of English and an array of notations of melodies are slowly decaying with no access whatsoever, to the music lovers.

The Muslim musicians of Sri Lanka went beyond boundaries of cultural or ethnic limitations in addressing the hearts of music audience and enriching the legacy of Sinhala music. They exploited the universality of the language of music to gain access to the spirit of common people.